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THE WORLD IS IN THE CHURCH

“I do not think I can say too many times that the world is too much with us. I have often wondered why, after getting victory over the world, anybody would want to court the world and allow it back in his or her life. It must be understood most emphatically that the world around us is in conflict with the Word within us. The two are absolutely incompatible. Jesus made it plain when He said, “In the world, but . . .” By that, He meant that although we were in the world, the world was not in us.

The evidence is all around us that it is difficult to break the tyranny of the world. Once the world gets a hold on us, it refused to let go. And it is not hard to see this in, for example, the impulse for entertainment and fun. We certainly live in a fun generation. Unless we can have fun, and unless that thing is going to entertain us, we will wander off to something that will. I am not surprised that this is out in the world, but I am greatly disappointed that it has come into the Church.”

– AW Tozer

“I’m embarrassed to be part of the church of Jesus today, because I believe it’s an embarrassment to a holy God. Most of our joy is clapping our hands and having a good time, and then afterwards we’re talking all the dribble of the world. Oh, to be lost in Him, to be consumed in Him.”

– Leonard Ravenhill

“You have to go into the world which is like a great leper colony; but if you carry Christ with you, you will never catch the world’s diseases. A man may be worth ever so much money, he will never get worldly if he keeps Christ on his heart. A man may have to tug and toil for his livelihood, and be very poor, he will never be discontented and murmuring if he lives close to Christ. O you who have to handle the world, see to it that you handle the Master more than the world! Some of you have to work with drunk and swearing men; others are cast into the midst of frivolities—O take my Master with you—and sin’s plagues can have no influence upon your moral nature!”

– Charles Spurgeon

“A whole new generation of Christians has come up believing that it is possible to ‘accept’ Christ without forsaking the world.”

– AW Tozer

James 4:4 Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.

1 John 2:15-16 Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.

Romans 12:2 And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

Titus 2:11-12 For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world;